


Once A Hero

by sabby1



Category: The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol, Conversations, Friendship, Gen, Heroes & Heroines, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Prompt Fill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-24
Updated: 2019-09-24
Packaged: 2020-10-27 14:54:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20762195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabby1/pseuds/sabby1
Summary: “Look,” he said with his best don’t-mess-with-grandpa expression. “Not that I don’t appreciate the whole Skywalker aesthetic of what you’re trying to do here, but it’s not gonna work."





	Once A Hero

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [sh_ficletinstruments](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/sh_ficletinstruments) collection. 

> This was PAINFUL to cut down to 500 words. It started with over 700. I'm in serious need of emotional adhesive strips. Maybe some bandages.

Simon Lovelace slogged up the dirt road between windswept fields of weathered grass. His knees protested the gradual incline, reminding him he was no longer what he once had been. 

Behind him, the sun was sliding into the ocean inside a blanket of misty clouds. Orange light bathed everything in a soft glow.

It was beautiful. It was cruel. His vision was bad during daytime; it was practically zero in the dark.

The sunset chased him to the yellow cottage at the top of the hill. He banged his fist on the worn oak door as the last stripe of pink dipped below the water.

Nobody answered.

“I know you’re there. Open up or I swear I’ll have a heart attack right on this welcome mat.”

The door creaked open.

Clary looked exactly the same.

Her fiery hair spilled in tousled waves around her soft, freckled features. Her green eyes gleamed in the light from inside the house. Her cherry lips pursed.

“What are you doing here?”

She wore a ratty bathrobe over a white T-shirt and an ancient pair of sweatpants that Simon remembered seeing on a set of hips not quite as narrow as Clary’s. The long legs were rolled up and held in place with safety pins.

He chuckled. “Can I come in?”

Clary offered him a seat at the kitchen table. She placed a steaming mug of tea in front of him and sat down with an identical mug and a bottle of whisky. She added several ounces to her tea.

Simon pushed his mug closer until it clinked against the bottle. She poured a small amount. He raised a single brow in a move he had picked up from someone much more intimidating. She added a strong splash. He nodded. 

She took a sip and put her mug down.

“I’m not going back. I can’t.”

She shoved a hand inside her robe and rubbed on a spot over her heart. 

Simon didn’t need to see the rune. Fifteen years. There were still days he woke up and it sucked the breath from his lungs.

He downed his tea and pushed the mug at the whisky bottle. Clary refilled it. He pulled it back.

“Look,” he said with his best don’t-mess-with-grandpa expression. “Not that I don’t appreciate the whole Skywalker aesthetic of what you’re trying to do here, but it’s not gonna work. It doesn’t matter if you’re here or in New York. I’ll still be your best friend, and someday you will have to bury me.”

That truth hurt her more than him. Clary was the one who would be left behind.

“Not today, though.” He rapped his knuckles on the table. “Today, I need you to support my creaky ass back down that hill because there’s an apocalypse and a bunch of young Shadowhunters in way over their heads. They need you, Fray, because Heaven knows I’m getting too old for this shit.”

“You’ve always wanted to say that.”

“You know me so well.” 


End file.
